The accused of the Muzaffarpur shelter home rape case, Brajesh Thakur was convicted with 18 others by a Delhi Court on Monday.
Brajesh Thakur was convicted under the POCSO (Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences) Act along with 18 others in the case of rape and sexual assault of minor girls who were kept at the shelter home run by Thakur.
Brajesh Thakur is also a former MLA from Bihar People’s Party.
Additional Sessions judge Saurabh Kulshreshtha convicted Thakur for aggravated sexual assault under POCSO Act and gang rape.
In the case, police had booked 20 accused out of which the court had acquitted one accused in the case. Out of the 19 convicts, 12 are men and 8 eight women.
The matter came in light after the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), in May 2018, submitted a report to the Bihar government that highlighted instances of sexual abuses at the shelter home.
A petition was filed in the Supreme Court by journalist Nivedita Jha in the matter seeking a court-monitored probe by an independent agency into the allegations.
At the shelter home in Muzaffarpur, at least 34 girls – aged seven to fourteen – were allegedly drugged, raped, forced to sleep naked and scalded with boiling water. Some of the girls were also forced to undergo an abortion.
The Supreme Court had in November 2018 transferred the investigation to the CBI after the Bihar government failed to handle the case with efficiency.